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Los Angeles Times
04-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
Thinking about America for the Fourth, plus the week's best movies in L.A.
Hello! I'm Mark Olsen. Welcome to another edition of your regular field guide to a world of Only Good Movies. Our colleagues at De Los ran a thoughtful and provocative interview this week with Patricia Riggen, director of 'Under the Same Moon,' which premiered at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. Andrea Flores spoke to Riggen about the film's legacy and how it might be different trying to make the film today. 'Under the Same Moon' traces the journey of 9-year-old Carlitos (Adrián Alonso) as he heads from Mexico to Los Angeles to find his mother Rosario (Kate del Castillo), an undocumented worker. He is aided along the way by another migrant, Enrique (Eugenio Derbez). Also featuring America Ferrera in a small role and an appearance by the band Los Tigres del Norte, the movie is currently available for rent on multiple digital platforms. At the time, the film broke box-office records for a Spanish-language film in the U.S., audiences resonating with its heartfelt emotions and focus on the bond between and mother and son. 'If I made 'Under the Same Moon' right now, I would not make it like that,' said Riggen. 'It would be dark as hell.' Riggen added, 'I wanted to make a movie that the Latino audience connected with and immigrants could watch. But the tone would be different. I would do a deep dive into the problem. I stayed away from making the movie political and concentrated more on the love story with the mother-son relationship. ... Now I feel like it's time to have more of a political angle. Half the country still believes that immigrants are criminals, but being able to feed your loved one is a human right.' Riggen said she and 'Same Moon' screenwriter Ligiah Villalobos have been working to adapt the story into a series. 'I find Hollywood, my industry, to be a little bit responsible for the hostility that Latinos and immigrants find as a community in the U.S.,' Riggen said. 'Our representation of Latinos has rarely been positive. We have to turn things around and represent the community in a positive light, not just the negative way that is prompting hostility by half of the country.' Maybe it's just me, but this year the Fourth of July is feeling extra emotional: fraught and complicated as America as a concept, an ideal and a current practical reality that feels so imperiled and fractured. It's difficult not to be in a mode of reflection rather than celebration. Local theaters are coming through with an array of films to help you meditate on the state of the nation, get away from all that or maybe a bit of both. The New Beverly Cinema will be screening 'Dazed and Confused,' Richard Linklater's 1993 ode to hanging out as a pathway to figuring yourself out, on Friday afternoon. 'The Return of the Living Dead,' Dan O'Bannon's horror-comedy, set over the Independence Day holiday, will play in the evening on Friday and Saturday. Steven Spielberg's 1981 'Raiders of the Lost Ark,' still a rousing action-adventure delight, will be at Vidiots on Friday. Tim Burton's 1985 'Pee-wee's Big Adventure' will play Friday and Saturday. Vidiots will also be showing John Carpenter's painfully prescient 1988 sci-fi-action classic 'They Live' on Saturday in 35mm. The American Cinematheque will screen Robert Altman's 'Nashville,' which, with all its contradictions, might sum up America about as well as any movie can. It plays at the Egyptian on Friday. I recently spoke to one of the film's stars, Ronee Blakley, about the film's enduring impact. 'It was just a bunch of talent put together by a bunch of great people,' she said. The Cinematheque will also screen the original Cannes cut of Richard Kelly's 2006 'Southland Tales' at the Los Feliz 3. With a ridiculously huge cast including Dwayne Johnson and Sarah Michelle Gellar, a convoluted conspiracy plot and a musical number with Justin Timberlake, the film captures something about 21st century America that few others manage. I spoke to Kelly about the film in 2019, ahead of when the Cannes cut played for the first time in the city. 'It was this really incredibly ambitious, sprawling film,' Kelly said. 'I was writing graphic novel prequels and it was just too much. We really didn't have the technology or the resources to finish it. It was that the ambition was just overflowing. I didn't have the discipline at the time to reign myself in. So we knew we were going into a situation where we had to just put our best foot forward. I think it was my lawyer who said at the time that getting into the competition at Cannes was the best thing and the worst thing that ever happened to 'Southland Tales.'' On Saturday at the Hollywood Bowl will be a 50th anniversary screening of Steven Spielberg's 'Jaws' with a live performance of John Williams' score by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, conducted by David Newman. The Frida Cinema will be showing Brian De Palma's 'Blow-Out,' which contains an astonishing sequence set against a fireworks display, along with a whole week of other Fourth of July-themed movies, including 'Nashville' and 'Dazed and Confused.' The American Cinematheque is launching the latest edition of its 70mm festival this week and it is (again) such a warm confirmation of why this is such a special moment for moviegoing in Los Angeles. The intersection of a specific print of a certain title at an exact time and theater leads to experiences that simply cannot be repeated. This year there are a handful of new titles and prints to the selection. Among those being promoted as playing the series for the first time are Mel Brooks' 'Spaceballs,' David Lynch's 'Dune,' Milos Forman's 'Amadeus,' Joel Schumacher's 'Flatliners,' John McTiernan's 'Die Hard,' and Ivan Reitman's 'Ghostbusters' Also among the films playing will be Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey,' David Lean's 'Lawrence of Arabia,' Alfred Hitchcock's 'North by Northwest' and 'Vertigo,' John Ford's 'The Searchers,' Sam Peckinpah's 'The Wild Bunch,' Jacques Tati's 'Playtime,' Paul Verhoeven's 'Total Recall,' James Cameron's 'Aliens,' Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise's 'West Side Story,' Spike Lee's 'Malcolm X,' Tony Scott's 'Top Gun' and Robert Altman's 'Short Cuts.' Filmmaker Willard Huyck will be present for a screening of his 'Howard the Duck.' Director Margaret Honda will be there for 70mm screenings of the experimental films 'Spectrum Reverse Spectrum' and 'Equinox.' More recent titles have also been programmed: Paul Thomas Anderson's 'Boogie Nights' and 'The Master,' Jordan Peele's 'Nope,' Alfonso Cuarón's 'Roma,' Christopher Nolan's 'Inception,' Damien Chazelle's 'Babylon' and Brady Corbet's 'The Brutalist.' 'In the Mood for Love' 25th anniversary To commemorate the film's 25th anniversary, Wong Kar-wai's 'In the Mood for Love' is back in theaters along with the rarely seen short film, 'In the Mood for Love 2001' that reunites the film's stars, Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung. In the 2022 Sight & Sound poll of the greatest films of all time, 'In the Mood for Love' was the highest-ranking film released during the 21st century. The story of two people in 1962 Hong Kong, each married to others yet feeling an intense connection, unsure of how to act on their emerging bond, the film is an overwhelming emotional experience in which every slight nuance or touch takes on cascading impact. In his original review, Kenneth Turan wrote, 'A swooningly cinematic exploration of romantic longing, both restrained and sensual, luxuriating in color, texture and sound, this film raises its fascination with enveloping atmosphere and suppressed emotion to a ravishing, almost hypnotic level.' 'Sinners' on streaming Ryan Coogler's 'Sinners' starts streaming today on Max. Whether you are just catching up to the movie or checking it out again, it's nice to have it so easily accessible. (And a 4K disc will be available next week.) The story of twin brothers Smoke and Stack, both played by Michael B. Jordan, as they return to their hometown in 1930s Mississippi to open a juke joint nightclub only to be beset by roving vampires, 'Sinners' is an astonishing horror film and a thoughtful treatise on legacy. And makes for a fine Fourth of July movie as well. In her review of the film, Amy Nicholson wrote, 'What a blood rush to exit Ryan Coogler's 'Sinners' aware that you've seen not merely a great movie but an eternal movie, one that will transcend today's box office and tomorrow's awards to live on as a forever favorite. If the cinema had a dozen more ambitious populists like Coogler, it would be in tip-top health. The young filmmaker who started his career with the 2013 Sundance indie 'Fruitvale Station' had to make three franchise hits — one 'Rocky' and two 'Black Panthers' — before getting the green-light to direct his own original spectacle. It was worth the wait. Let the next Coogler get there faster.'
Los Angeles Times
01-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
‘Under the Same Moon' director on immigration crackdown: ‘It's called fascism'
When Mexican director Patricia Riggen first debuted her critically acclaimed feature film 'Under the Same Moon' 18 years ago, she anticipated tears from audiences and increased sympathy to the plight of migrants in the United States. But she could have never predicted the militarized crackdown on migrants happening today. 'If I made 'Under the Same Moon' right now, I would not make it like that,' said Riggen in a phone interview. 'It would be dark as hell.' The fictional drama follows 9-year-old Carlitos (played by Adrián Alonso), who lives in Mexico with his ailing grandmother, while his mother Rosario (Kate del Castillo) navigates life as an undocumented worker in Los Angeles. After his grandmother's sudden death, Carlitos crosses the border alone in search of his mother, piecing together details of her whereabouts from their past routine phone calls. After its 2007 debut at the Sundance Film Festival, where it received a standing ovation, 'Under the Same Moon,' which was titled 'La Misma Luna' in Spanish, was picked up by [Fox] Searchlight Pictures and released in theaters the following year. It broke box office records for any Spanish-language movie in the United States at the time. While lighthearted in brief moments, thanks to Carlitos' bond with a grouchy wayward migrant named Enrique (Eugenio Derbez), the storyline reflected the harrowing journey traversed by many migrants in the U.S. in the early 2000s, told through the eyes of a child. 'It gave a human face to a statistic and to a political problem,' says Riggen. 'That's why it became the phenomenon that it was back then, and now here we are,' said Riggen — referring to the ongoing ICE sweeps by masked law enforcement, detainment of U.S. citizens and the deportations of migrations without due process. De Los interviewed Riggen about the enduring impact of her film, 'Under the Same Moon,' the same day she reunited with Derbez and screenwriter Ligiah Villalobos on a June 26 panel hosted by the National Assn. of Latino Independent Producers. 'It is the first time that we are getting together again, and it's an important time,' Riggen said. 'I think that this movie [provides] a little bit of hope for the Latino community.' This interview has been edited and shortened for clarity. It's been almost two decades since the release of 'Under the Same Moon.' How have its themes evolved since 2007? Unfortunately, nothing has changed for the better. It's changed for the worse. I feel like things are worse than ever. There's things that never happened before, like deportations to third-party countries, or detentions without due process, detentions by people who are not identifying themselves. We don't even know if they are actually ICE agents. As a member of the Latin American community, I can tell you that it has a name and it's called fascism. It gives me shivers, because if you are from Latin America you immediately remember Argentina, Chile and Brazil. That's how they used to operate. They would just come over to their homes and take them. No identification, no nothing. I wish the American people could see that, but they don't know it because they've never seen it before. It is the worst-case scenario that I can imagine. When we made 'La Misma Luna,' there were thousands of unaccompanied minors. That was the original inspiration for Ligiah Villalobos, when she wrote the first draft of the film. It was a groundbreaking movie because it used to be a string of sad, depressing dark [immigration] movies, but this was different. The movie had a more heartwarming, positive outlook. It still touched on super complex subject matters, but the intention was to show immigrants in a positive light, good people with good values. People become immigrants out of necessity, because of poverty, violence, persecution. If you were to make the movie now, would the tone overshadow those glimmers of hope? That's how I feel right now. I would do a deep dive like 'El Norte,' because that film was another emblematic movie on the subject matter. That was dark and tough. Then came 'La Misma Luna,' which I thought was lighter. I wanted to make a movie that the Latino audience connected with and immigrants could watch. But the tone would be different. I would do a deep dive into the problem. I stayed away from making the movie political and concentrated more on the love story with the mother-son relationship. ... Now I feel like it's time to have more of a political angle. Half the country still believes that immigrants are criminals, but being able to feed your loved one is a human right. If you continued the film where it left off, with Carlitos and his mom reuniting, where would they be in today's America? That's what [Villalobos] and I have been working on. We've been approached a few times to create a series on 'La Misma Luna,' so to answer that question, it will be in the TV series that I'm hoping for. I feel like the country is really attuned to the plight of the immigrants [now], which wasn't necessarily the case 17 years ago. What do you think was so appealing about this film when it was released? It touched on universal emotional issues that everybody could identify with. You didn't need to be Mexican or have crossed the border. Love was at the center of it. That's how I conceived it. Sometimes I get the feeling that if [Alonso] had been a mainstream actor, he would have gotten nominated for something, but that's the story of making Latino movies. We haven't been able to break through the mainstream and it's something that we are fighting every day. I find Hollywood, my industry, to be a little bit responsible for the hostility that Latinos and immigrants find as a community in the U.S. Our representation of Latinos has rarely been positive. We have to turn things around and represent the community in a positive light, not just the negative way that is prompting hostility by half of the country.
